WWYD: Son and Money

[ClamFandango]

DS (15yo) gets £60per month allowance, from which he pays for his phone contract (sim only: £6), and all non-school uniform clothes plus socialising, snacks etc.
He is not good at saving, although we encourage him to save £30 per month - so that it doesn't all get spent on snacks and small things. On top of that he will usually ask for money from family for birthday and Christmas, and usually gets given about £150 in total each time. He tends to save up for a bit and then blow the lot on a big ticket item (usually equipment for his music hobby, clothes or gifts for friends).
He recently bought his sister a v generous birthday gift, and a valentine gift for his girlfriend. Then he dropped his mobile phone and it broke - repair cost barely less than replacement (with secondhand reconditioned phone), so he spent £200 on a new secondhand phone, which cleaned his savings out and we had to advance him £60, which wipes out his next two months' savings (so his allowance is down to £30 per month, which is generally earmarked for phone contract and snacks at school).
This morning he was sad that he won't be able to buy his best friend a birthday present next month, and got very defensive when I suggested he was angling for a further loan / more cash from us. I said he wasn't getting any more money from me beyond the allowance, less the loan he already owes, and he had to learn to save more prudently.

We could afford to give him something to buy the friend a present, but the purpose behind the allowance is to teach him budgeting. We feel so mean saying "tough luck - you've spent up and that's it. Tell your friend you'll get him something in a couple of months' time". AIBU to take this stance?

He bought his sister a very generous present. Why on his budget did he do that? Also how much did he spend on his gf and was that necessary?

My AIBU isn't whether he has enough allowance, it's whether I should bail him out when he is careless with his phone again.
(Incidentally, we have spare (old) phones in the house, which he is welcome to, but he insists on having a certain level of phone.)

I get that you’re encouraging him to budget which is never a bad thing, but only providing him with school uniform, socks and pants, whilst expecting him to foot the bill for everything else out of effectively £30 a month is pretty harsh…maybe even if he saved £15/£20 that would be slightly more realistic

You could renegotiate the payback period of the loan you’ve already made. On the basis that even most loan sharks won’t take 50% of income

@Terribletwos. He and his sister have a lovely relationship - she bought him a generous gift for his last birthday, and he wanted to reciprocate.

The gf gift was around £20 I think. Not "necessary" but his choice.

Tell him he can have one of the old phones to sell and he can use the money for the birthday present.

My dd got £40 / month 15 years ago. And I bought most of her clothes as well

You've got to allow him to earn money one way or another.

But that just shows it’s not enough if he’s regularly having to wipe out his “savings” surely?

I think the £60 would be more than generous, more than I give my son actually, if he didn’t have to buy clothes out of that. Can that be looked at and renegotiated? Sure if he wants some expensive designer top then he would have to save, but could you buy his regular clothing or not?

Well you don’t know whether he’ll be ‘careless with his phone again’, so it’s hard to say what you should in that scenario and also not really relevant to the current issue, which is that he wants some money to buy his friend a present.
I think that if you can afford it, it would be nice to waive £20 of the money he owes you for the phone so that he can buy his friend a present. If you can’t afford to then don’t.

Incidentally his sister is 14yo and she has a slightly smaller allowance (it's age-based, at 4X age per month). She has a couple of hundred in her "savings" at any given point.
And she buys more clothes than him.

You have pretty much exactly the same set up as we do. Only we are well off and could pay more. But I think this amount is balanced

Those things are clearly linked though! If he was being given an adequate amount of money to budget with and had run out of money because he spent it all on sweets and xbox points and wanted more for a gift for a friend then I’d be saying no, don’t bail him out.

But with only £60 a month, expected to essentially fund his own life in terms of socialising, clothes, snacks, phone bill AND you expect him to save money, considering the reason he is in this situation is because he’s paid out of his own pocket for a phone replacement/repair, of course you should help him.

Very kind of him to buy her a generous present when she has plenty of money herself. Is she equally as generous when buying him gifts?

Don't they go anywhere and do things.

My fifteen year old went to a concert last night with her friends in a neighbouring city. She went on the train so that was probably £10 and the ticket was twenty something.

It's ridiculous you expect anyone to buy clothing out of only £60 per month and he has to pay his phone £6 out of that. Then you expect him to save £30 a month. It's beyond belief. So basically you expect him to cloth himself with £24 a month. Less than £1 a day. And that is miraculously supposed to allow him to socialise too! It's beyond a joke. It would take him 3 months just to buy a pair of trainers another 3 months to buy a coat. No wonder the poor child has to spend his birthday and Xmas money on clothes. As a parent you should be buying his clothing until he's at least 18. At 15 he is still a child. I get you want him to learn to budget but you're setting him up to fail and being very mean by giving him an impossible task. You could at least give him the child benefit you claim for him.

I agree with the majority. It really does seem unnecessarily harsh. I know teenagers don’t need the most expensive things but even ‘decent’ stuff is expensive.

I have 2 at home and the nearly 18 year old has everything paid for while she’s still at college. That’s bus pass, phone (SIM only), lunches and occasionally money towards days out with her friends - depends on what they’re doing etc. She’s not massively into branded clothes so is a bit easier to keep her going. She also has 2 part time jobs and saves all her money from that, with a view to getting a car. Now and then she’ll use some of it but only after proper consideration as to whether it’s worth it for her. She’s having a gap year but is just staying home and working to save to make uni easier so all we’ll ask he to contribute is what we’ll lose in CB.

The 14 year old also has everything paid for in the same way. He is a bit more into his branded stuff and will spend around £170 ish on trainers, for example. However, we tend to put around £100 towards them as we’d spend that anyway. He also gets expensive tracksuits but will ask for them for Christmas and his birthday and is always searching for the best price. The most recent pair of trainers he managed to find reduced to £130.

We don’t put a price limit on it; as PPs said, it is our responsibility as parents to provide whatever is needed.

This attitude of we will only pay X for our DC’s upbringing reminds me of those CMS claims where the absent father just pays a small amount which does not cover anything like the actual cost of the child.

So what would you do if you needed to repair or replace a big ticket item but didn't have immediate funds? Use a credit card or get a loan.

I get you don't want to just buy another phone if he's been careless, but accidents happen. Loan him the £200 for the phone and reduce his allowance by £10 a month until it's paid off.

You say savings are for spending but then moan he's spent all his savings. And he's spent them on big things, not frittered £60 a month on chocolate bars and fizzy drink. Sounds to me he's budgeting well, just an unexpected thing happened (the phone) which can happen to all of us.

I would bail him out but maybe find him a job he can do eg dishwasher every day. Tell him he starts now and pay for his friends present/ give him money nearer the time so he knows you are serious.

You can only give him what you can afford so I don't see the issue.

I’d give him the money for the friends birthday and stop controlling what he has to save. I don’t think a 15 year old should have to buy their own clothes. Without saving he has approx £15 a week, that’s not enough for clothes and fun.

DD 16 gets £100 a month, we pay for her phone and her clothes. The rules here are we pay for what she needs and the allowance is for what she wants, so if she wants expensive items she has to save for them. She wears fake tan and lashes which she buys out of her allowance and also uses it for travel to see friends etc. She rarely has anything left.

He shouldn't have to pay for his own phone contract or all of his clothes. A phone is an essential for a teen nowadays.

My 15 year old gets £15 a week but I pay for her phone contract and her clothes, all of her classes, activities and subs, Spotify account, essential toiletries and sanitary products. She spends the money on socialising, snacks and drinks when out, make up and gifts and the occasional piece of clothing if she goes shopping with friends.

How lovely that your son and daughter are so loving and generous to each other. I would model that back at him and would give him a big top up while feeling happy that my son was such a good egg. It really won’t corrupt his fiscal probity.

"DS (15yo) gets £60per month allowance, from which he pays for his phone contract (sim only: £6), and all non-school uniform clothes plus socialising, snacks etc."

Your son should not be expected to buy all his clothes, aged only 15!

"We could afford to give him something to buy the friend a present, but the purpose behind the allowance is to teach him budgeting. We feel so mean saying "tough luck - you've spent up and that's it. Tell your friend you'll get him something in a couple of months' time". AIBU to take this stance?"
For someone who says "we feel so mean", you're arguing hard against anyone here who suggests you do anything different - so I don't think you do feel mean at all, I think you feel all righteous and smug and some sort of super-parent.

FYI, YABU to take the stance you have taken. HTH.

OP I think the answers are 7nduly harsh and unrealistic in a cost of living crisis.

My DD's get £50 per month to save up for big ticket items or speak as they wish, I buy all school uniform and they buy their own clothes.

Unfortunately we don't have the cash to increase this ( we have a similar budget for ourselves- the same until very recently).

If phones break then they can use an old one ( aka the phone of shame🤣) . They can do jobs round the house to try and increase their income which I think should be the offer to your son so he can buy his friend a gift.

My parents did this more me when I was a child and I have done the same.